


Eyes closed

by ClaraCivry (Kat_Of_Dresden)



Category: Now You See Me (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Hospitalization, Hurt Danny, Hurt/Comfort, Major Character Injury, Whump, lula/jack but background, post NYSM2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2016-08-01
Packaged: 2018-07-26 17:53:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7584163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kat_Of_Dresden/pseuds/ClaraCivry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Danny storms off after a big fight with the horsemen and ends up in a lot of trouble. Hurt!Danny and concerned horsemen post now you see me 2.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Their life was from predictable, or boring, but the horsemen had fallen into a type of routine. They did some research, maybe pulled off some assignments, did some stunts and then went back into hiding. Police forces were still after them, so it was better to lay low whenever possible. The eye had given them a safehouse, a nice apartment in a town in the outskirts of New York, complete with some ultra-realistic masks so when they went out for groceries or anything they wouldn't be recognized.

There were some members who did more than others in the house, of course,: Danny cleaned every room and occasionally did laundry, Jack cooked (sometimes better sometimes worse, sometimes he just ordered chinese) and Merritt did very little, if he was honest, sometimes he set the table or unloaded the dishwasher once in a month so that he could claim that he helped around too.

Of course, living together was sometimes difficult, could even become a challenge. Jack and Lula were specially messy, which got on Danny's nerves, which made him irritating which got on everyone's nerves. And then there was a couple of days in which everyone was angry at everyone and not speaking to each other and then at some point Lula decided it had been enough, apologized for her part and tried to get the boys together so they reconciled.

It was a precarious balance that used to be slightly better when Dylan visited, but he was generally too busy and only dropped by every once in a while to make sure they hadn't killed each other. Which they were getting closer and closer every day.

There was a huge fight in May, in which things were thrown, names were called and people's belonging mysteriously changed places. After fifteen minutes of screaming, Jack told Danny and they all would be better off without him and they all wished that he'd leave them alone once and for all and Danny stormed off, slamming the door behind him, which effectively ended the argument. For a couple of hours, they just continued with their lives while muttering that they were right and the rest of them were wrong. Of course it was.

But of course, after some time, Jack started wondering if he'd been too harsh on their partner, if maybe it had been too much. It was 2 AM and Danny wasn't back yet, so he started to worry. He called him, but it turned out that the phone had been left behind in the living room. Shit. They had no way of communicating with him and it was already the middle of the night. What if the police had caught him? What if, in his anger, he'd forgotten to look both ways before crossing and a car had run him over? What if...? Shit, Jack needed the other man back or he'd go crazy.

Lula appeared behind him from the bedroom, still in her pyjamas.

“Did you get any sleep?” Jack asked. At least one of them should get some rest.

“Yeah, a bit. He's not back yet?”

“No, and he left his phone and wallet. Where can he be? What if something has happened? We aren't supposed to be out for so long, and he's the first one that reminds us of it.”

Lula tried to be positive as she always was, but she was worried too. This was very out of character for Danny.

“Maybe he just needed some time to blow off some steam. If he's not back tomorrow morning we'll call Dylan and go look for him, ok?”

Jack sighed, but nodded. It seemed like a decent idea, because it gave that idiot the whole night to come back, appear with an “and another thing” in his lips and make everything okay again. But for some reason, Jack felt that wasn't going to happen, that something had happened to their partner. They had no reason to think like that, though, there was no evidence that anything was wrong.

 But the next morning came and there was still no sign of Danny, so things were officially concerning. They called Dylan and him and Li helped the Horsemen look for their missing friend. They searched police stations, hospitals, magic shops, bars... but nothing. He had apparently vanished, fell from the face of the earth. He could, because he knew how to do it, but had he really been so angry as to disappear completely?

Jack was biting on his nails, guilt eating him. He shouldn't have said those things, insulted him, no matter how angry he'd been. It had been too much, and there was no excuse, no “it was the heat of the moment” no “I didn't really mean it”. It had been too much and now they could lose their friend forever, just like they lost Henley and didn't hear from her again. He wanted to punch something, he wanted to be rid of that horrible sensation in his gut.

Lula and Merritt also felt bad, if not as guilty as Jack. Ever since they started living together, they'd let Danny do most of the housework and deal with anything that required organisation skills, simply assumed he would do it. And didn't say thank you enough, just took him for granted. Sure, he wasn't the easiest person to live with, but neither were they. They all had their flaws, but Danny's were maybe the most prominent. Maybe if they had helped more around the house or complained less when they had to rehearse he wouldn't have been so irritating all the time.

Dylan felt this was partly his fault, too. He should have seen that they weren't getting along, ask them to be given more space, or maybe gone to live with them for a while to calm things down. He should have noticed that things were tense and found a way to improve things before it all became this level of horrible. They had many enemies, there were and many people who could have taken him to get information of the eye, or the horsemen or who knew what. He sighed, looking at his hands trying to think about a way to fix this, but nothing came to mind.

The hours were long and empty and frustrating as they looked and found no one. Everybody relived the last words they've said to their friend and thought of ways in which they could've been nicer to him, made him feel better, less unwelcome. Everything was suddenly wrong.

And then one of their contacts told them of a John Doe that had been admitted in Lenox Hill hospital and matched his description.

 


	2. Chapter 2

They had been lucky in some aspects, not so much in others.

The doctor that had taken in the “John Doe” had been a fan of the horsemen and had put Danny in a private room, not letting anyone out of her closest friends get in. They were keeping him as a John Doe to avoid the implication of the police forces or other authorities. The nurses she worked with had also promised not to say anything, keep to themselves. This was where they'd been lucky.

As they had feared, the John Doe really was Danny, and he was in a very bad state. Someone had called an ambulance after finding his unconscious bleeding body in an alley and the medical personnel had done their best to stabilize him. It hadn't been easy: Danny had a broken arm, a punctured lung, internal bleeding in his abdomen, extensive bruises three gashes on his neck and cheek that had needed stitching.

He'd grown out his hair again, so some of the bruises were hidden, but he still looked like death warmed over. He was all pale skin, stitches and bandages and had all sorts of medical machines attached to him from heart monitors, to oxygen cannula, Ivs...And he was so still, so quiet, it was unnatural for Danny to be this quiet, unsettling. He was an excessive talker, loud, unable to stand still, forever bragging and showing off. This was not him. Couldn't be him.

“But he'll be fine, right?” Lula said, voicing everyone's thoughts after the doctor finished explaining his injuries. “He was real bad but now he'll be okay.”

“I wish I could tell you that, I really do, but I can't, not at this moment. If the bleeds start again we may have problems stopping them again, and we don't know if his lung will heal properly yet, and the other isn't exactly in perfect shape. If his lungs give up there could not be time for us to do anything, but we'll know more when he wakes up.”

“You mean he hasn't been awake since you picked him up?” Jack asked. He thought Danny was just sleeping, recovering his strength. Being unconscious for days was very different.

“He hasn't responded to anything, which our main cause for concern. He isn't comatose, but his response to stimuli is very limited, and he hasn't opened his eyes once. We checked for brain injury but found nothing, and only found a strange unregistered compound in his blood work. Our labs our looking further into it, but so far we have nothing.”

There was a general look of defeat and sorrow in the eyes of the remaining horsemen and Dylan, as they took in all that new information. While they had been looking for him in bars and magic shops, Danny had been beaten up, left in an alley and injected with some unknown substance that prevented him from waking up. There was a chance that he wouldn't live past tomorrow because one of his very damaged life supporting organs could fail. It was even worse than any of their nightmares.

“His chances aren't bad. He's young and has made it so far but his numbers aren't promising. I'll leave you guys some time alone.” The doctor said, and left after Merritt and Lula thanked her for everything. These bad news weren't her fault.

Dylan clenched his fists. Who had done this? Who had known where they lived to abduct one of them at their lowest and beat him up like that? And why hadn't Danny fought back? Had they injected him with that coma-inducer first? It was a horrifying thought, someone, possibly several people, beating up the poor boy while he was on the floor defenseless. Dylan needed to find whoever had done this and make them pay. (Revenge was the only way he keep crash thoughts of having failed Danny so very badly – revenge was better than grief)

Merritt was sitting in chair on the opposite side of the room, as far from the bed as possible. Sure, he hadn't always had the best relationship with this kid. Atlas was arrogant, conceited and yes, a bit of a dick. He was easily his least favorite horseman, member of the team. But that didn't mean that he wasn't a good kid deep down, and an invaluable member of the team. And maybe, just maybe, he'd been more hard on the boy than he oughta. Maybe Atlas didn't deserve to be the target of so many jokes, so many mean comments. Whatever his faults, he really tried hard and was genuinely talented. He didn't deserve this.

Lula was fidgeting, pacing through the room, trying to think of ways to fix this, solve this horrible crisis. She liked repairing things, mending everything, producing smiles. And if they lost Danny like this, the smiles would be gone for a long time. She hadn't known him as long as the others, and she admitted that he could be challenging to work and/or live with, but he had a good heart and nice ideas and a lot of drive and she guessed that he had a lot of issues with his past, with control, with hos own self. But even with all his weirdness, it was easy to end up loving him, for all his motivation, his determination... and it was heartbreaking to see him like this. Every time she remembered the doctor's words... They needed to a solution – find a way to turn this situation around. For Danny, and for the sake of all of them.

Jack was in the chair next to the head of the bed, trying to hold back tears. He felt that this was partly his fault. It had been him who'd said those horrible things that had made their friends leave the safety of the house. If he hadn't, then Danny wouldn't have left and whoever had done it wouldn't have got to him. At least, he wouldn't have been alone. This was his fault and it was killing Jack, drowning him in guilt. As if it had been him directly who had broken his arm, punctured his lung, punched him so hard that he'd been bleeding on the inside. Your fault.

And the last words Jack had told the injured boy. _We would be better off without you._ How wrong he'd been, how clearly he could see it now. Without him, half of the stunts they'd pulled off wouldn't have been possible. And the bad thing was Jack knew it affected Danny hearing those things, because despite his sometimes uncaring cold exterior, Danny was very vulnerable. Which was why it had affected him so much as to leave... He'd caused this. Danny was fighting for his life because had purposefully hurt him. Oh, what he would give in that moment to change places.To be the one on the bed, and not the one who had to watch all those machines and hear all those bad prognosis.

The hour seemed eternal in the hospital, while they tried to gather clues to figure out who had done it and waited for some positive change on Danny's condition. The frustration of not knowing and him only getting worse made their spirit's sink even lower.

All in all, they felt heartbroken, injured, and they felt loss. Whatever was their next step in life, they wanted the great J Daniel Atlas with them.

The next day, there was a paper in the door of the safehouse.

_Follow my instructions if you want your friend to wake up again_

 


	3. Chapter 3

There was an immediate reaction in all of them.

Dylan dropped the note with the mysterious words: he knew it was important evidence, but all he wanted to do was destroy those cursed words. Jack quite literally punched a wall, hoping the pain in his knuckles would distract him from his personal turmoil, and let out a scream. Lula picked up the note, with Merritt next to her, both examining it, trying to find a clue, their minds going through every person they'd met on the last month to see who may want to go against them.

They had a bunch of enemies, and many of them were powerful enough to hire some goons to beat somebody up and have access to experimental chemicals, as well as a number of reasons to want to hurt them. And as much as they thought, they couldn't conclude who it could be. The image of their injured companion was too fresh, everyone seemed a viable candidate.

Dylan scanned the note and sent the scanned picture to one of the few friends he still had left in the lab of the FBI, telling her this was absolutely top priority, a matter of life and death. He planned to take the original note the eye headquarters, as this could be an attack against the organisation and not just them.

They went to the hospital again, hoping for more instructions, or to see a favorable change in their friend's condition. Every instruction Every instruction was a clue, a way to find more about the person or people who were behind this. But nothing, nothing all morning. Danny wasn't getting better either, his lungs were improving and he could end up needing to be hooked to a ventilator, which would decrease his chances of a full recovery even more.

Lula brought some flowers and squeezed the unconscious boy's hand, hoping to give him some comfort and willing him to live, to keep on fighting.

“You're stronger than this, I know you are. Please don't leave us.”

That day, Jack was having more trouble keeping the tears at bay. His mind kept going back to their fight and the horrible things he said to his friend. He pushed him away and into the arms of those who drugged him and nearly killed him. He hated himself almost as much as he hated whoever had done that.

The next instruction appeared the next day on their doorstep, again. They had to put a camera, but the criminals had disabled them before leaving it. It was an address, a time and the names of the four of them in the front, and a simple “you know what's at stake” in the back. The meeting was going to take place at 8 pm so they had time to think, and to be in the hospital for a bit longer.

They had all sorts of recording devices on, in case they heard any voices or found anything that stood out, to be analysed later. Every little thing could change the situation around, and the easier for them to end up unscathed was to unmask the perpetrators before having to play their game.

And so they spent their day there, planning, agreeing on details and listening to the maddening sound of the machines in the room, all the monitors and whatnot. It would have been more bearable if Danny woke up and drowned the mechanical beep with his stream of words, but the horsemen were once again met with silence.

“I don't want to leave him alone like this, with no one here. It could be a trap to lure us out.” Dylan said.

“Me neither.” Merritt said, looking suspiciously out of the window. 

“Maybe I can help.” A familiar voice said in the door. “May I?”

“Henley!”

She'd been keeping tabs on her former partners for a while, just to make sure everything was ok. Until it wasn't, and even if she expected (and hoped) for it to be a tick to bring her back, she couldn't help going to see for herself when she heard that Danny was in the hospital. She only saw him after greeting and hugging everyone, even the new recruit, seemed very nice. But after the hellos and the welcome backs she finally saw Danny and understood that this was no trick.

“Oh my god...”

She hadn't known it was this bad, had just pictured Danny with a concussion or a leg in a cast complaining about the service and demanding to go back home because he was perfectly fine and he hated being stuck in a bed. It hadn't occurred to her that maybe he was staying in bed because he couldn't do otherwise. It was so heartbreaking, how pale and lifeless he was, how still and quiet, how very unlike him under those sheets... The bruises were turning dark purple, giving him an even more hurt look. Henley could hardly look.

The others explained her what they knew so far, and she listened attentively.

“So you guys are going now to find out who did this. Yeah, you go do that, I'll stay here.”

If she was honest, Henley had a feeling that she was going to stay there for a long time.

 

* * *

 

So the Horsemen left for the mystery address in the second note, which they found out was an office inside an office building. Quite an unusual place to choose, but they'd been in stranger ones. They went there tense, recording every detail and trying to guess what was going to happen to be ready.. But there were no more instructions, no recorded message when they got into the office. This wasn't something they had expected.

As they were inside, waiting for something to happen, the blinds closed completely, as if by remotely control, as well as some automatic locks. They were trapped in an office that had been automatically sealed from someplace outside. Probably they were going to be able to find a way out, but there was something off about the whole thing.

“Who's there?” Jack yelled at a security camera. “What the hell do you want?”

There was no answer. Just a soft sound, like a hiss and then a strange white-ish gas started filling the room. Uh oh. This meant they had no time, this meant they had walked into a trap. In less than a minute they were all in the floor, at the mercy of their enemies.

* * *

 

 

Ignoring her friend's troubles, Henley sat in the chair next to Danny's bed, absentmindedly caressing his cold cheek with her hand. She had needed to leave, to find her own voice, her own story beyond the horsemen and the eye. She'd needed to find her place, someplace that helped her grow, but that didn't mean that she'd forgotten about their adventures as Horseman. It didn't mean that she didn't miss them, because she did.

Especially Danny. Sometimes, even if she'd been really busy the last months, she found herself watching Horsemen videos and smiling like a schoolgirl when she saw him. They never had anything easy and Danny was an absolute nightmare in anything emotional, but he'd been important in her life, and he still was in a sense. She sighed. She wished she could do something more, she suddenly found herself wishing she was a doctor so she could help better.

“You better wake up and get better, Danny” she whispered, voice breaking. “I didn't come all the way here just to lose you.”

There was a shadow of a man on the other side of the hospital room door. A gun with a silencer safely hidden, he smiled. He'd taken care of the Horsemen and the doctor, and now it was time to play.

The man opened the door and Henley gasped.

 


	4. Chapter 4

“You are a difficult woman to track down, Henley, especially since the whole Horseman shebang. I tried several ways to find you, but couldn't.”

The man was holding a gun, pointing at Henley. She should have known. Her past was coming back to haunt her, as she knew it would someday. She just never imagined that Danny would get hurt because of it.

“I thought you were in jail.” Where he should have been. Rotting for the rest of his life.

When Henley had said that she'd liked magicians a bit too much she hadn't been joking, she'd been really accurate. But when she was young and innocent she hadn't thought that magicians, who seemed lovable nerds form the outside, could also be be aggressive jerks like this one who used magic to lure young wide-eyed girls to be his assistant. So she'd put an end to it, made the police find him and book him for what he'd done and some other things she'd pin on him. And she'd made sure that he knew it was her, who he'd been underestimating for months. Now she wished she'd been anonymous, oh, how she wished he hadn't known.

“You're not the only one who has some tricks up their sleeve, dear.” There was a repulsive smile on his lips. “Obviously when I got out, the first thing I thought of was, how can I ruin the life of the person who ruined mine in the worst way?”

“You ruined you own life, idiot. I just helped the police find you.”

She needed to keep him talking, to find a way in which she could get herself and Danny out of his reach. Out of this mess.

“Yeah, I know what you did. Did I treat you oh-so-badly?” The man with mock-concern.

“You treated everyone badly. You deserved what you got and you should still be in jail.”

“Yet, here I am, free as a bird. And I managed to lure you out, didn't I? Poor Daniel Atlas, the great magician, the showman, the horseman. Doctors say that even if it's doubtful, he could still recover. But those doctors are not taking one thing into account...me. He won't wake again. Oh, and don't expect you horsemen buddies to come here and rescue you both, I've taken care of them.”

Henley's eyes widened. She'd been hoping they'd appear and save the day, if she was honest.

“What have you done?”

“Nothing as permanent as what I'll do to loverboy over in that bed. You see, I figured the way to make you pay for what you did to me wasn't just hurting you, maybe humiliating you in front of an audience, no, it would hurt so much more if you saw the one man you loved die because of you. You'd spend every day regretting ever knowing him, because it was you that caused his death and his last days being spent in terrible pain.”

Henley looked at the man in the bed with apprehension- There needed to be a way out of this, but she was too freaked out to find it. Who knew what this man had done with the horsemen, and he meant to kill Danny. Kill him, right then and there. And Danny was already very weak, very delicate, it wouldn't be difficult. She wanted to cry, because it wasn't fair. One mistake in her past, one bad encounter, and not only she was paying for it but Danny too.

She had loved him, even if they weren't meant to be, even if they had their misunderstandings and fights. Because deep down, Danny was a great guy, smart, talented, and affectionate and caring in his own extremely convoluted way. There was a lot of him she missed, and a lot that many people would miss if he was gone. This couldn't be happening – there had to be a way out- There was always a way out.

That idiot perched himself on the edge of Danny's bed, gun in his hand.

“Poor Daniel Atlas. Chose the wrong assistant and ended up being assaulted and dying before his time. Probably not even thirty, huh? You know he was keeping tabs on you still, after all these years, helping you from the shadows. And now he's all broken up, fighting for his life in this hospital. You know, I had some help, but it was me who broke his arm. And I enjoyed every moment of it.”

Henley closed her fists. If she had to take that idiot down with her own hands, then she would. He had no right to lay a hand on Danny, much less brag about how he'd hurt him.

“Get away. If you want me, fine, do whatever with me, but leave him alone. Danny has nothing to do with us, and you've hurt enough.”

“Have I?”

“Yes, you have.” A familiar voice said behind them. Jack.

“Now drop that weapon and get away from the bed, slowly.”

“How did you get out? This is impossible, I dosed you with my forversleep drug, there's no way you woke up.”

“There's one thing you didn't take into account....me.”

A voice said, appearing from seemingly nowhere.

“Who the hell are you?”

“Hi! I'm Li, I'm new. Pleasure to meet you, Henley, by the way.”

And then there were the other three, Lula, Dylan and Merritt, pointing their own guns at the man, who left his own weapon with a resigned expression and put his hands up.

“You see, when these four didn't appear in a meeting that was scheduled me and my grandma got worried and started looking for them. Turns out you're really sloppy, Mr. Glomner, and the people you hire and not happy at all, so it was easy to find you and your secret warehouses and safes where you hid very useful things for us, like the antidote to your drug. You should really pay your thugs better, they were happy to let us in, man.” Li continued, nearly glowing while he saw the man being taken away byt he authorities.

Henley released a breath she didn't know she'd been holding.

“So... you guys have the antidote? You can wake Danny again.”

Lula smiled and nodded merrily.

“And it works like a charm!” She said.

And so Danny was injected with the antidote and the rest of the magicians waited patiently and expectantly, as if they were a prince charming waiting for their sleeping beauty to wake up. Maybe, just maybe, they were nearing the end of this nightmare.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is all I wanttttt! 
> 
> Your kudos and comments are super appreciated :)


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